Where’s Your Caravan?: My Life on Football’s B-Roads

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I took an immediate dislike to him and, knowing what I know now, should have just said, ‘Get your own coffee, short arse!’ but I had to respect the fact that he was a high profile player, and I was just a schoolboy. Also, being abandoned by the side of the road on the M62 didn’t really appeal to me at the time. I haven’t met him since, but apparently Adrian Heath is a decent fella, so maybe he WAS almightily pissed off at having to travel to Grimsby, but for me back then, it was well and truly a case of ‘welcome to professional football’.

I spent my school holidays and a lot of weekends at Everton, and in that time I had to stay in quite a few different homes: some good, and some bad. My time with the Spellman family was the most memorable and enjoyable, great local banter, homely food, and a top friend in ‘Spelly’ – another young lad on schoolboy forms at Everton.

It was extremely daunting to be at such a big club and to be away from my family at the same time, but mixing with footballing icons was a great experience. Neville Southall was a decent fella, as was Gordon Banks, the goalkeeping coach, and many of their top players at the time, such as Paul Bracewell, Kevin Sheedy, and Trevor Steven, were all top people and bubbly characters, but one person from that era is far from being on my Christmas list: Pat van den Hauwe.

What a nasty piece of work that bloke was: arrogant, rude, obnoxious, and selfish, and that’s before he had even opened his mouth. He was a decent left-back in his day though, with a celebrity lifestyle off the pitch that sometimes got him into hot, if not boiling, water. I was about fifteen years of age and had sneaked into one of Liverpool’s nightclubs, Coconut Grove, with some of the other schoolboys – slightly naughty, but it was only a bit of adolescent fun, and as the average age in there was only about sixteen anyway, it wasn’t a major problem. I remember walking towards some of the lads when van den Hauwe, already having had plenty of pop, shouted, ‘Who the fuck’s he? He’s not with us!’

He looked towards me and said, ‘What are you looking at? You’re not with us.’

The rest of the lads reassured him that I was at ‘his’ club, but I was amazed at how much of a tosser someone in his position could be. I wasn’t the only one. Later that night, just before we were set to leave, I saw him in the toilet being abused and manhandled by a couple of thick-set Liverpudlian lads. They obviously wanted a ‘little chat’ with Mr van den Hauwe, and I couldn’t help smiling as Pat stumbled into the toilet trough muttering something under his breath. He was the first ‘big time’ footballer I had come across, but he was certainly not the last. I haven’t met Pat since those days, and he may well be a decent fella too, but as yet I have had no one step up to vouch for him!

Apart from buying my first record, Yazz – ‘The Only Way Is Up’, I don’t look back too fondly on those days – to be honest, buying that record is not exactly a highlight is it? Yes, it was vinyl back then, and yes, I am going to say it, those were the days!

I do remember being told off for coming back to the digs ‘too early’ one night, which must have been a first – I’m not sure they realised that hanging about on the streets wasn’t the safest option in Liverpool at the time. Accidentally spraying my dad and the whole inside of the car with my strawberry milkshake when he arrived to pick me up, this after a three hour drive and a ten hour day, was also something I remember with great fondness. His glare could have killed a small animal at twenty paces.

I did miss home and playing for my local team, and I honestly didn’t feel like Everton was the club for me. When it came to the decisions about apprenticeships, I had already made my mind up, I didn’t want to sign. I hadn’t really settled in Liverpool and the knowledge that no apprentice had made it into the first team for ten years hardly filled any of the lads with confidence. The youth set-up was pretty crude, with old-school coaches and old-school attitudes, and I think, in the end, it was a mutual agreement that staying on wasn’t the best option for me. Let’s not beat about the bush though, one thing is for sure, I should have stayed and given it a right good go, as trying to get back into a top flight club would go on to prove very difficult during my career. I could have easily taken three or four more years of pain in an effort to play in at least one Premier League game. I know some players that have dined out for years on the fact that they have appeared in the Premiership for thirty-five minutes, but, credit where it is due, it’s thirty-five minutes more than I have.

Before my spell at Everton, I had nearly signed schoolboy forms for both Sheffield United and Leeds United, who had shown huge interest in me at the time. Together with my dad and his friend, Guy Allen, who was a respected football figure in the town, we were invited to both clubs and shown around their stadiums. The coaches told us that I was the type of player that they really wanted, and that they had big hopes for me. I think I had actually been pretty close to signing for Leeds, until Everton stepped in with their offer. Everton were the league and cup champions at the time, so it had been an easy choice to make in the end.

But it hadn’t worked out for me, and such was my dad’s frustration and annoyance at the way things had panned out at Everton that he blankly refused an approach from Man United shortly afterwards. I still rib him about that phone call today, although I understand why he felt the way he did. Still, seeing how those young players at Man United have been nurtured, and how they have developed, they didn’t do a bad job did they?

I was ‘saved’ from my A-levels by Grimsby Town, my hometown club, approaching me and offering to take me back on an apprenticeship. I quickly abandoned my compass, pen and pencil, and joined their ranks. Not telling my then girlfriend (now wife), friends, or any of the teachers at the school that I was leaving for pastures new was perhaps, on reflection, a trifle rash, but I knew what I wanted to do, and that was to play football for a living. I’m sure that if you had offered even the geekiest of students at the sixth form I was attending the chance to play football and earn some decent money, they would have done the same – they may well have finished their game of Dungeons and Dragons first (the Warhammer of the day), but I’m sure they too would have gone. No doubt those same lads are now lawyers, accountants, and architects, who go snowboarding three times a year, and have corporate boxes at Man United – but let’s not dwell on that.

It would be a bit naïve to think that staying on to do my A-levels was a possibility after Grimsby Town’s offer, it wasn’t, but I do hugely regret abandoning all forms of further education. It is always hard to get back into education, especially after a long break. Several years later, and shortly after I had signed for Hull City, I did try to complete an A-level in psychology. I lasted a few months, but the course being on a Tuesday night didn’t really help, and when the tutor announced he was stepping down because he was suffering from a particularly bad case of paranoid schizophrenia, I went off the idea.

After a short spell on a YTS, in fact very short, at three months, it was time for business. I was soon signed on professional forms by Grimsby Town’s manager Alan Buckley, and his assistant Arthur Mann, and, at seventeen years of age, I was soon reporting for my first pre-season training for the 89/90 season. I was incredibly excited to be at the club, and couldn’t wait for the season to start.

At the moment, as I prepare to dig deep and remember my first season in professional football, I am sat ‘home alone’ in Devon. My wife and children are ‘up north’ – although everywhere is up north compared to Devon – they are visiting both sets of grandparents on the east coast. The time is 2.50pm and I am digging through dusty old programmes to try to jog my memory concerning dates and games played. You may wonder why 2.50pm is particularly relevant. Well, I am sat at home and am not in a changing room putting my shin pads on, listening to a few last minute instructions (which is always a tough ask, as, at the best of times, it sounds like a nightclub in most changing rooms), and waiting for the bell to sound.

The fact is I am a bit crocked at the moment, slight tears to both my groin and my knee cartilage mean that I am out of action for a few weeks at least. This, and the fact that the lads are playing in Manchester, means that it is a weekend off for yours truly.

Everything had been going so well since I arrived back at my former club Oxford United, apart from my first game back that is, a dramatic last minute loss while leading, at fellow title chasers, Luton Town.

In his wisdom that night, the referee, and his good friend the much maligned fourth official, added on seven minutes of injury time. Yes, you heard right, SEVEN minutes. I think he added time for both teams’ warm-ups before the game, never mind the injuries sustained during it. As you can imagine, with the ten thousand home fans seeing the number seven raised aloft on the minutes board for the first time in living memory, they started cheering, and inevitably, in the seventh minute of said injury time, one of our lads lost his man at a corner, and they equalised. Straightaway I asked the referee how long there was to go – after twenty two years in this game I sort of have a sixth sense for doom – to which he replied with surprising cheer, ‘I’m adding another minute on for “their” celebrations’, to which I replied, with as much sarcasm as was possible for a slightly tired and disgruntled thirty eight year old, ‘Why don’t you add another minute on for good luck, you know you want to and I tell you what, why don’t you come up for their next corner and head the bloody thing in yourself?’

I escaped the booking, but I didn’t escape the second ‘extra’ minute, or the corner that he gave in the last seconds of the last minute of the added time.

Directly from the corner, with what proved to be the last kick of the game, our keeper Ryan Clarke misjudged the flight of the ball, and we watched on as it sailed into the top corner of the net. The place erupted and I watched in disbelief as their players celebrated as if they had won the World Cup and Champions League, all in one go. I half expected the ref to take his shirt off and start crowd surfing, and I could have sworn I saw him smiling at one point. It was my first game back as captain, and to say I felt robbed is the understatement of the year. At the final whistle, and without the benefit of a sword to fall on, I grabbed the ball and kicked it high into the back row. I lost it in the changing room afterwards, kicking anything that moved, and having a go at some of the lads, no doubt making a great first impression in my first game back at the club.

To make matters worse I had travelled in with Ryan Clarke that night. All ‘Clarky’ kept saying during that return journey was, ‘Fuck me, Chris, how did I let that corner go in?’

I couldn’t have agreed more, but Ryan is a really nice lad so I just kept quiet and offered my support (obviously while thinking to myself, ‘Fuck me, Clarky, how DID you let that corner go in?’).

To prolong the agony, or to give that crushing defeat a bit of humour, whichever way you want to look at it, the following day the local newspaper reporter, Jon Murray, approached me half laughing and said, ‘Should I put the claim into the club or give it to you direct?’

He continued, as I was none the wiser, ‘That ball you volleyed into the crowd the other night rebounded off the roof of the stand, and smashed into my laptop.’

Come on now, what are the chances of that? You can imagine the write up I got the next day.

The following few games went well, with three consecutive wins, but it was in the final ten minutes of that last win that my season changed. I stretched for a ball and felt something go in my groin. I tried to play the next few games, having injections to help me do so, but it was no good, I was going, or should I say limping, through the motions. I did return for another top of the table clash against Stevenage, a sort of title decider, but I tore my cartilage with only twenty seconds of the game gone. It was a bad neck-high challenge by our number five (me), but I wanted my opposing midfielder to know I was there. He got the message, but after forty-five minutes so did I, I couldn’t play on with cartilage damage for much longer, and I ended up hobbling off early in the second half.

I now have three weeks to get ready for what will probably be my sixth end of season play-offs in the last seven seasons, my seventh in all, and another very short summer. Our lead at the top of the table has vanished, and it is now more play-off uncertainty. My body seems to be rebelling against any form of recovery, but I really hope that the miscellany of treatments I am having work. A combination of ice, rehab, and not driving for three hours a day should help.

So, I am sat down beginning to type away; it is now 3.20pm, and I haven’t even turned on Sky Sports News to check the results; it is just too stressful. Who would be a fan eh? I will have a look at around 4.45 though – or more likely 4.52pm when the referee will have definitely blown his whistle! I will also check the results of the other nine teams that I have played for at the same time, as I do every week.

I find that to be able to write, especially for a long article, or in this case a book, the house has to be tidy (‘that’s the OCD,’ I hear you say) and it has to be quiet, both of which are a rarity with three children around. I have been writing a daily blog for the local paper for the past couple of years, but having my three-year-old daughter on my knee, trying to help the other two with homework (Cameron’s is testing for me at the best of times, never mind for him), and rushing to free up the laptop for my wife, just adds to the madness.

I do miss my children (and wife, of course!) when I’m away, or in this case when they are, and this week has been no exception. Had we all been together it would have been the normal pilgrimage to the beach with surfboards and a picnic, as the sun has been beating down in Devon this week. The first day or so without the gang was bearable, a few hours of decorating (I got paint everywhere), mending a broken ornament (I glued my fingers together), and attempting some gardening (using a lawnmower that has lost a wheel is plain stupid) kept me busy, but after that it was all downhill. I started to do jobs that just immediately put me in a bad mood, but that us blokes all around the country seem to do nonetheless. I tried to tidy the garage yesterday, but ended up coming out two hours later having achieved absolutely nothing; I swore around seventy times, trapped my finger twice, and left having gained no extra space at all. After playing at ten clubs during my career, I still have boxes marked ‘kitchen’ that have yet to even see a kitchen. Worryingly, there is also a box with ‘children’s pets’ written on it. I dare not even open it!

Then last night, after scrolling down the enormous checklist I had been ‘kindly’ left with, I attempted to sort the loft out. I cut my hand on an old picture and sustained some sort of allergic reaction to the three tonnes of foam insulation up there. And today, why I don’t know, I joined the other crazy lot and went to the dump, or should I say ‘recycle’ centre. It was crammed with people driving in with either just one plank of wood to throw away, or a small tree, large sofa, and four mattresses, all rammed into the back of a Ford Fiesta. How anything gets recycled lord only knows, as whenever you ask one of the lads where to put anything they shout, ‘Shove it on the pile, pal’ – TVs, batteries, duvets, asbestos, cyanide go on ‘throw it on, mate.’

The only thing I have actually achieved over the last week is to regularly hammer the gym, and my body with it. This is something you do when you are out of action and injured; it becomes an absolute obsession to get fit and every day seems like a week. It is as if you can’t function in your normal life until your body is one hundred per cent right, and you are back playing. You also feel like a leper in and around the club. Most managers’ philosophy on injured players is the same, ‘you can’t help me at the moment, so make yourself scarce’. If the team is winning you are even more leper-like, whereas if the team is on a losing streak your every movement and strike of a ball is monitored, until you are back fit and able to help the team.

I’ve had to have a quick look at Sky Sports News, and it’s 0–0 so far.

(Before I go back into my first season of football again, I feel the need to interject and officially apologise for the use of any offensive language. I will only use it when it is very, very necessary.)